Second Samnite War

The Second Samnite War was the second of three Samnite Wars that were fought from 343 to 290 BC between the rising Roman Republic and the Samnites, their hostile immediate neighbors. The war lasted from 326 BC until 304 BC, when the Romans captured the Samnite capital of Bovianum, ending the war.

Background
The Samnites were a southern Italian people that were related to the Romans, and the two were originally allies. They fought against the Latins and Campanians at the Battle of Trifanum after the end of the First Samnite War. The Samnites, Latins, and Campanians were each early enemies of the expansionist Roman Republic, who conquered most of their lands. In 327 BC, the Samnites attempted to regain their land by allying with the Etruscan League against the Romans.

In 327 BC, the Romans crushed the revolt of the Etruscan Tarquinii by capturing the city of Tarquinii, and the Roman general Gaius Julius led a punitive expedition against the Tarquinii's Samnite allies in the south. In 326 BC, this expedition took off.

War
The first major battle of the war took place at Caudine Forks in Apulia, where Samnite general Gaius Pontius ambushed Titus Veturius Albinus' army and destroyed the Romans in one of their worst defeats: over 20,000 Roman troops were killed in showers of arrows from the cliffs.

In 316 BC, the Samnites invaded Rome itself, besieging the city of Capua after defeating the consular army of Spurius Nautius Rutilius, fighting Marcus Popillius Laenas in the city. Laenas was relieved by Gaius Fulvius Silvanus' army and Capua was rescued by the Lucanians, who attacked the besieging Samnites from the rear and routed them. The city was spared the siege, and the Roman consul died of wounds soon after. Silvanus gained military power as dictator in the absence of Rutilius (who was captured), and defeated the Samnites at Vesuvius before capturing Salernum and Buxentium from the Samnite Kingdom.

The Romans, with the Lucanians and The Greek Cities at their side, eventually humbled the Samnites, taking Bovianum in 306 BC and ending the Second Samnite War. The fall of Bovianum led to the Samnites' subjugation, but they would again rebel in the Third Samnite War of the 290s BC.